Point of View

- a smorgasbord

Lots was said, written  and heard during the duration of the Earth Summit 2002. Below is a smorgasbord of what was said by statesmen, delegates, environmentalists and journalists.

• "Only when you are rich enough to feed yourself can you worry about the environment and future generations. It is time we got our priorities straight. " - Bjorn Lomborg, Director of Denmark's Environmental Assessment Institute 
  

• "On every important issue, the government has either lied or U-turned .. on climate change, agriculture, biotechnology, planning, Blair has become the enemy of the greens. 'We have the worst government we have ever had on green issues." Zac and Edward Goldsmith, Environmental campaigners. (Edward Goldsmith, 74, and his nephew Zac – are, respectively, founder and current editor of the Ecologist magazine.)
  

• " ... corporate giants will stand accused of unleashing a ferocious attack on the environment while grabbing from the mouths of the poor and lining the pockets of the rich. The current period could well be remembered as a golden age of naivety" - Mark Townsend
  

• ( the 10 years since Rio have seen an) "unmitigated triumph for globalisation". While world output has increased by 50%, there are still 1 billion people living in poverty. - Kevin Watkins, Oxfam's senior policy adviser
  

• " .. the prosperous countries of the developed world bear a special responsibility. The industrialized nations must truly open up their markets to products from developing countries. Protective tariffs and other trade barriers have no place in this day and age. Gerhard Schroeder, Chancellor of Germany
  

• " Global warming does not stop at national borders. Ratify Kyoto Protocol. In particular, I call upon the United States to live up to its responsibility for climate protection and to make a contribution of equal value to reducing greenhouse gases." Gerhard Schroeder, Chancellor of Germany
  

• " .. post-Enron, it's hard to believe that companies can be trusted to keep their own books, let alone save the world. " – Naomi Klein
  

• "We want our nation to exist for ever and ever and not to be drowned because of the greed of the industrialised world" - Saufatu Sopoanga, prime minister of Tuvalu, a Pacific island state
  

• "Economic development based on the destruction of nature is suicide. God first created plants and the animals and then man. If the plants are animals are dying, guess who is next," President Abel Pacheco of Costa Rica. 
  (Costa Rica,  Latin America's most environmentally progressive country, announced that it would no longer allow coal mining or oil exploration.)
  

• ".. political circumstances allow famine and hunger" – Amartya Sen
  

• "In Zambia, genetically modified food aid has been refused. In Malawi reserves were sold abroad and people are eating green maize from this year's exiguous crop, leaving no seed for next - the very opposite of sustainable development" - Simon Broadbent , visiting fellow at the National Institute of Economic and Social Research
  

• "They (the richest countries) have the wealth. They have the technology. And they contribute disproportionately to global environmental problems," Kofi Annan, UN Secretary General

Surprise of the Summit!

McDonald's and UNICEF working towards charity! - the money raised will  help children suffering from polio. A joint document released by the WHO and FAO also notes that  "The shift to diets high in saturated fats, sugar and refined foods has contributed to worsening nutrition and the growth of obesity in children."

Fast food companies - take heed!

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Our acknowledgements due to The Guardian, BBC, UN, WorldWatch, and several other websites for the information used to compile this Factfile. 

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